Step 7: Breaking ceramic shell to reveal rough
bronze casting and then welding, grinding and polishing to finish building sculpture

(Please scroll down until you
come to "Next Step")

When the bronze cools, the shell is carefully
broken off with a hammer and the metal sprues and metal cup are cut off.

The two pieces for each owl are then sand
blasted to remove any remaining shell.

It's time to "build" the sculpture in
metal.

Since this sculpture was cast in only two
pieces, the first step in metal is welding these two pieces together. A larger
sculpture may have 20 pieces or more. They are put together just like a big
three dimensional jigsaw puzzle.

The weld line is removed with very careful
grinding, engraving, sanding and polishing.

Air hose powered hand tools (called die
grinders) with sharp carbide bits of every shape and size, rotating abrasive disks,
flexible sandpaper "cross-pads" and other polishing tools are used to finish
both the welds and overall surface of the owl. Imperfections and impurities
are removed with additional grinding and precision "tig" welding.